BOSTON (AP) — Madison Chock and Evan Bates became the first ice dancers to win three consecutive world championships in nearly three decades on Saturday night, and the Americans were holding onto first place with their jazzy free skate following a strong performance by Canadian rivals Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier.
Chock and Bates finished with 222.06 points, while Gilles and Poirier took the silver medal for the second straight year with 216.54. Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson landed on the podium in third, earning Britain’s first world medal of any color since Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean finished their run of four straight ice dance titles in 1984.
Oksana Grishuk and Evgeni Platov were the last to win three in a row, triumphing four straight times for Russia from 1994-97.
“Coming in here, we weren’t thinking about a three-peat or any type of title defense. It was a standalone event,” Bates said. “We were prepared as we could possibly be and we skated as well as we could have.”
Now, Chock and Bates are ready to turn their attention to their big goal: the Winter Olympics in February.
The longtime partners have been on the stage before, and were part of the U.S. squad that won team gold at the 2022 Games in Beijing — following a protracted investigation into Russian doping. But for all their success, Chock and Bates have never stood on an Olympic podium in ice dance itself, finishing just off it in fourth place three years ago.
“I think the Olympic season certainly carries a different weight than the other three years,” Chock said. “You have this incredible opportunity to reach the entire world, and it makes it really special, because it amplifies our voices on and off the ice.”
The Americans and Canadians have come to dominate ice dance in recent years, winning six of the nine medals awarded in the past three years. And on Saturday night, Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko finished fifth for the U.S., continuing its impressive showing in the nation’s first home worlds since 2016.
On Friday night, Alysa Liu completed her remarkable comeback from a brief retirement by becoming the first American woman to win a world title since Kimmie Meissner in 2006. Isabeau Levito and Amber Glenn joined her in the top five.
They could add to their gold haul on Saturday night, when American star Ilia Malinin tries defend his title in the free skate.
The 20-year-old from Fairfax, Virginia, landed a pair of quads and a stellar triple axel on Thursday night to score 110.41 points, just three off the world record set by Nathan Chen at the 2022 Beijing Olympics. That gave Malinin a comfortable but not insurmountable lead over Yuma Kagiyma of Japan in what has become a two-man race to the title.
Mikhail Shaidorov of Kazakhstan was a distant third with 94.77 points, and Kevin Aymoz of France and Shun Sato of Japan were close behind him, in a preview of the top contenders for the Milan-Cortina Olympics in February.
The U.S. is trying to secure the maximum three men’s spots for the Olympics, a quota decided by how it finishes in Boston. Malinin is certain to give the Americans one good score — the best two count in the formula — while the other will depend on Andrew Torgashev, who begins the free skate in eighth, and Jason Brown, who was 12th after his short program.
